


if you can't take the heat

by violetinfidel



Series: comfort fics [3]
Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Platonic Relationship, another vent! yay!, anyway, but its there so thats why i put the warning, cuz greens so supportive and god knows vio needs some supporting sometimes, green link - Freeform, i just have some kind of weakness for the green/vio friendship dynamic, its more dream sequence type stuff, its only partially vent it was also a warmup based on an idea a friend and i were discussing, maybe this is cheapshot angst but shut up bc i enjoy it, thats putting it in very general terms but even so its true, the character death isnt like real, the violence thing is only explicit for a few sentences here and there, vio link - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-07
Updated: 2018-05-07
Packaged: 2019-05-03 08:43:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14565291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violetinfidel/pseuds/violetinfidel
Summary: vio still gets nightmares about his stay at the fire temple. more specifically, he still gets nightmares about everything that could've gone wrong.





	if you can't take the heat

**Author's Note:**

  * For [105ttt](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=105ttt).



Sometimes, just when Vio starts to think that he’s getting his sleep schedule on track again,  _ something  _ comes along and gives him a friendly reminder why it never works. 

The something in question is sometimes his schedule, but usually it’s nightmares. 

Most of the time he avoids sleep until it’s absolutely necessary- by the time he actually gets to bed he’s too thoroughly exhausted to do much more than fall onto the mattress and pass out, and when it gets to that point he’s also too exhausted to have any dreams.

It’s not healthy, this he’s been told more times than he can even begin to guess, but it’s the only thing that works. Otherwise he tries to sleep and manages maybe an hour and then wakes up feeling even more exhausted than before.

But despite all this, he’s being forced to call it a night early, because it’s supposed to be a busy day tomorrow and Green won’t leave him alone until he’s satisfied that he’s in bed and sleeping. He wants to explain the situation to him, to tell him that he thinks he’s going to feel a lot  _ worse _ if they press the issue, but the he shies from the thought of having to actually spill what’s going on and he thinks they’d just say it’s stupid anyway.

So, loath as he is to do it, he obeys and goes to his room and tries to suppress his mounting anxiety and, miraculously, sleeps.

It’s hot.

It isn’t just garden-variety middle-of-summer hot, it’s arid and searing and every breath he takes seems to scald his lungs. There’s something irritating and dry covering every inch of exposed skin and it forms a thin grayish film that sticks to his skin and doesn’t seem to come off no matter what he does.

It’s a struggle to keep his eyes open with all the heat and the ash, and his eyes water so badly he has to blink a hundred times before he has any kind of visibility, and when his vision clears he sees the other three standing there below him, across a river of lava.

( _ Hylia, not this again, please. _ )

He knows how this plays out. He doesn’t say them, but the words fall from his mouth anyway- arrogant, condescending, mocking, falsely so but convincing enough to infuriate them. Then Shadow’s there, somehow acting even more haughty and gloating than himself, resting behind him on the throne and announcing Vio’s new allegiance.

“No,” Vio wants to say, wants to get up off the polished stone throne and go to them, “This is all an act, I’m not really with him- just play along, just let me do this, I promise I’m still on your side.”

But his lips are sealed and he feels like he’s glued to his seat as Green announces his challenge. Shadow asks him whether he’ll indulge in the duel and Vio says yes even as he’s screaming no, just like he has the past hundred times.

If there’s one thing Vio will concede, it’s that Shadow knows showbusiness like no other. The ground rumbles, an angry beast, as a rounded rock platform rises in the middle of the river and the lava parts to let it, sluices off the sides and leaves an open arena for the fight.

“Don’t,” Vio is saying, repeating it like a mantra, as he and Green make their ways onto separate sides of it, “Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t make me do this.”

Shadow’s spouting rules like a commentator but they fall on deaf ears; it’s the same old song and dance and by now he’s tuned out the music, knows the steps by heart.

He darts forward, cuts Green’s sleeve, draws a thin line of blood; a warning, only a taste of what’s to come. Green dodges away, to put space between them and give himself some time to think, and nearly gets charred by geyser of flame erupting from one of the stone figureheads. The distraction is too good of an opportunity to let slide- while Green’s busy recovering from his close scrape, he gets behind him and works up a strike from above, uses the figureheads to his advantage, and the blow would have cleaved Green in half if he hadn’t blocked it at the last second.

He knows Blue and Red are watching in anguish, and distantly he can hear Shadow laughing, but none of them are important now; his full focus is on Green, and one missed moment could spell the difference between life and death (a road that goes both ways).

He tries to miss a step, to screw up his own footing or redirect his strikes, but it feels like his body isn’t really  _ his _ , like someone’s taken the reigns from him and he’s sitting in the backseat watching. It’s someone else whose foot gets crushed under Green’s heavy heel, and it’s someone else who’s  _ enraged _ by this, and it’s someone else who buries Green under a flurry of slashes so heavy it’s all he can do to cower and block and  _ hope _ .

Green seems to realize how dire the situation is. He takes a calculated step back and poises himself and then charges, rushes Vio (someone else) and hopes to throw him off balance, and they cross blades.

It’s someone else who runs Green clean through with the sword.

No trickery, no knocking the air from his lungs and the feeling from his body just for the time being; it’s an honest-to-Hylia stab, straight through the gut, hilt-deep, and it’s someone else who rips it right back out (like he’s unsheathing a sword, coolly, impassively) and steps back.

It’s  _ Vio _ who strains to go to Green as he falls, grimy with sweat and ash and already tacky with blood.  _ Vio _ struggles to run over to kneel beside him, to comfort him or heal him or  _ something _ , as Blue and Red jump the gap between land and platform.  _ Vio _ wants to rip the first aid kit from his bag and bandage him up and reassure him that he’ll be okay, that he didn’t mean for it to happen, that he’ll wake up fine in the morning, after he rests.

But his legs don’t listen to him anymore, and his mind isn’t his own as he walks back to Shadow, boasting and prideful and, in some sick and twisted way, triumphant. Shadow takes a terrible sort of glee in watching their hopeless efforts to help Green- potions aren’t working, and their faerie is conspicuously absent, and there’s nothing any of them can do as Green dies there, on the stone in the middle of enemy territory.

The sweat that slicks his face and neck and sticks his clothes to his back has nothing to do with the temperature.

 

He wakes in a cold sweat, most of the bedding thrown to the floor, his heart pounding so rapidly he thinks he might pass out, and when he brings his hands to his face to rub the sleep from his eyes his cheeks are wet.

He sits there hunched over trying to control his breathing and calm himself down for Hylia knows how long- it could be a minute or it could be an hour. At some point he goes to open his window and get some air in because it feels like he’s suffocating, but it doesn’t help at all, and he lays in bed feeling like the entire world’s about to end on him until someone knocks on his door.

Even then he still feels like everything’s crashing down on him, and when they call his name and ask if they can come in he doesn’t answer, just finds a blanket and tucks himself half under it and prays to Hylia they don’t decide to come in and check on him.

They decide to come in and check on him.

“Vio,” Says a concerned voice, and Hylia’s sake, it’s Green, and he doesn’t know if that’s the worst or the best thing for the current situation, “I heard you yell, is everything okay?”

Vio elects not to respond, and in hindsight maybe that isn’t the best thing to do, because that just worries Green more, and he ends up coming over and sitting on the bed beside him.

“Vio? C’mon, I know you’re up. What’s going on?” 

“...Nothing.” His throat is dry and tight and he doubts he could say much more than that even if he wanted to, and his eyes are burning and he’s on the verge of crying again.

“I’m not that stupid, Vio, you oughta know that by now.” He feels Green get off the bed for a moment, and then he gets back on, toting all the bedding he’d kicked off in his sleep. “What’s all that doing on the floor?”

Vio only shrugs.

“Vio. Talk to me.” When Vio’s silent and shows no signs of changing that, he sighs and says “Fine, we’ll do this the hard way” and manages to get his arms around him and heaves him into a sitting position (an admirable feat, considering Vio puts all his effort into becoming entirely dead weight). There’s a moment of quiet, Vio trying to stay faced away, eyes closed like he’s still half-asleep, and Green trying to get him to stop doing that, and then Green says “Have you been crying?”

“I’m fine.”

“Obviously you’re not,” Green says, sounding a touch irritated but mostly just worried. “Vio- hey, c’mon- you have to talk to me or I can’t help you. What happened? And before you say nothing or you’re fine or go back to bed or whatever, the answer’s already I’m not having any of that. You’re clearly upset and you’re clearly not  _ fine _ . I’ll stay here all night if I have to.”

Vio considers staying quiet just so he’ll have company.

“It was just,” He says, and struggles to get the words out, “A nightmare. That’s all.”

“What was it?”

“I’d rather not.”

“I get them too, Vio. Talking about it helps.”

Vio just shakes his head and tries to pull the blanket a little higher. 

“I’m serious, Vio. This isn’t me being the therapist or the mom friend or whatever. It really does help, I’m telling you from experience.”

“It’s stupid.”

“No it’s not. If it’s upset you this much it’s definitely not  _ stupid _ . And even if it seems dumb, I’m not judging you for it, I promise. It happens to everyone.”

It’s a long time, or feels like it, before Vio thinks he’s able to string a coherent sentence together. 

“I’ve had it before,” He says, finally, and Green makes a sympathetic sound and rests a hand on his shoulder. “A lot. It and… a couple of others. It’s…” He pauses, and knows he’s about to sound like the most childish idiot to ever walk the planet, “They’re why I don’t sleep much. I just- I can’t sleep well. It’s easier when I don’t dream.”

“That bad?” Green asks gently, and he sighs and rubs Vio’s shoulder. “I get it,” He says, “Really. It used to happen to me too. What’s it about?” He notices Vio’s expression and says, delicately, “You don’t have to go into detail or anything.”

Vio wants badly to just pretend that he’s better and to tell Green to go back to his room so he can deal with it alone, but he also wants badly to  _ tell _ him, to explain exactly why he can’t shake this weird heavy guilt that he knows he has no reason to feel. And, vulnerable as he feels, the latter wins out, and he caves, and in as much detail as he can bear to give he describes it, and by the time he’s finished he really does think he’s about to die.

It’s a long while before he feels like he can breathe again, before he can wipe his face dry and sit up and take a deep breath and look Green in the eyes.

“Vio,” Green says, softly, and then he pulls him into a tight hug and doesn’t let go, and Vio can feel his composure start to slip again. “You’re okay,” He tells him, “There’s no reason to feel guilty about it. There’s nothing to forgive, okay? Everyone’s fine. I’m fine.”

And Green, bless his soul, doesn’t press for anything more, doesn’t overdo it, just quietly gathers up the bedding and lays it back out neatly over them and stays. In the morning, Vio can’t remember the last time he slept so well.

 


End file.
